农民们想办法挽救数百万头猪免于被屠宰

农民们想办法挽救数百万头猪免于被屠宰

A month ago, America's pork farmers were in crisis. About 40 percent of the country's pork plants were shut down because they had become hot spots of coronavirus infection.

一个月前，美国的猪肉养殖户陷入了危机。全国约有40%的猪肉工厂被关闭，因为它们已经成为冠状病毒感染的热点。

Pork producers who had been shipping, collectively, almost half a million hogs each day to those plants suddenly had no place to send of all their animals, and little space to house the equal number of new piglets that are born every day.

那些每天向这些工厂运送近50万头猪的猪肉生产商，突然没有地方运送他们所有的动物，也没有足够的空间容纳每天出生的同等数量的新生仔猪。

Pork producers and industry analysts said that if factories didn't re-open quickly, they'd be forced to euthanize millions of hogs on their farms.

猪肉生产商和行业分析人士说，如果工厂不迅速复工，他们将被迫对自家农场的数百万头猪实施安乐死。

But that worst case scenario seems to not be happening. According to estimates of pork producers and officials in the hardest-hit states of Minnesota and Iowa, hog farmers have been forced to kill and dispose of fewer than 200,000 animals so far.

但最糟糕的情况似乎并没有发生。据猪肉生产商和受影响最严重的明尼苏达州和爱荷华州官员估计，迄今为止，养猪户被迫宰杀和处置的生猪不足20万只。

"Farmers are pretty inventive people," says David Preisler, CEO of the Minnesota Pork Producers Association. He says farmers made some quick adaptations--they converted older buildings into additional housing for hogs, fed the animals low-energy rations that kept them from gaining weight rapidly, and sent some of their animals to local butcher shops.

“农民是很有创造力的人，”明尼苏达州猪肉生产者协会的首席执行官大卫·普里斯勒说。他说，农民们迅速做出了一些调整——他们把老旧的建筑改造成额外的养猪场所，用低能量的口粮喂养动物以防止它们迅速长胖，还把一些动物送到当地的肉店。

Others hogs were shipped halfway across the country, from Minnesota to Pennsylvania or California, to processing plants that could handle them.

其他的猪则被运到美国的另一边，从明尼苏达运到宾夕法尼亚或加利福尼亚，运到有能力处理它们的加工厂。

Minnesota's Board of Animal Health acquired two 80-acre sites. As of May 29, the sites had accepted 17,058 hog carcasses. They could handle many more. Perhaps 100,000 to 150,000 carcasses have been trucked to rendering plants, which convert them into basic materials like grease and protein powder.

明尼苏达州动物健康委员会收购了两处80英亩的土地。截至5月29日，有关地点共接收17058头猪尸体。他们可以处理更多。大约有10万到15万头牛的尸体被用卡车运到工厂，由工厂将它们转化为基本原料，如油脂和蛋白粉。

In Iowa, the state is offering financial help to farmers who need to euthanize hogs. Farmers applied for funding to dispose of about 25,000 animals but have not yet told the state how many of them actually were euthanized. In mid-May, Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig told Iowa Public Radio that farmers in his state had been forced to kill fewer than 5,000 market-ready hogs so far.

在爱荷华州，州政府为需要对猪实施安乐死的农民提供财政援助。农民们申请了资金来处理大约25000只动物，但是他们还没有告诉州政府到底有多少动物被实施了安乐死。5月中旬，爱荷华州农业部长迈克·奈格对爱荷华州公共电台说，该州农民迄今被迫宰杀了不到5000头准备上市的生猪。

Hog industry officials say they've heard of few cases of euthanized hogs in other major pork-producing states.

养猪业官员说，他们很少听说其他主要养猪州对猪实施安乐死的案例。

At the moment, the crisis appears to be ebbing. Most pork plants have resumed production, but Preisler says "it's too early to tell" whether farmers will be forced to kill more of their pigs. The plants, he says, are running at about 82 percent of their normal capacity."

目前，(疫情)危机似乎正在消退。大多数猪肉加工厂已经恢复生产，但是普里斯勒说“现在判断”农户是否会被迫宰杀更多的猪还为时过早。他说，这些工厂的运行速度大约只有正常产能的82%。“